Hey, guys, stay tuned to the end of this episode to find out the winners of the real life radio rental VHS tapes and the one of a kind radio rental store manager, action figure.

Thanks, guys. Enjoy the show. Oh, welcome, friend, welcome, it is I, Terry Coronation and I have been expecting you, I'm packing up right now, as you can see, getting ready for my big excursion to the Dominican Republic, long overdue.

Let me tell you, I've been cramped up in here for the last few months, but nevertheless, I'm quite excited to spend the day today with you, my dear friend, my dear listener, my dear friend. Now, would you be able to feed the cat while I'm away? Just shove some Skittles and jerky through the mail slot. You can drink from the toilet. Today is all about celebration. I have some champagne here somewhere. Oh, it appears I finished that particular bottle this morning.

Never mind that I have quite the finale in store for you. I've chosen one of my favorite tapes to share today with all of my adoring fans. I didn't pack it away now. Mm hmm.

Oh, here it is. Oh, this is good. Sometimes you think you know someone, you sit next to them for a year or years maybe, but then all of a sudden one day they surprise you and after years of friendship, years of coexistence, realize you may have never really known them at all.

So this is probably 2002 maybe, I mean, I'm not 22 years old, I was in the telecommunications industry and it's my first real job out of college, my first corporate job. The normal cubicle setup. My cube mate next to me and we became pretty good friends, he was maybe 45, 46, long grey hair, well put together, shirt tucked in prim and proper and kind of looked up to him a little bit. And we were a cube mate, so we became good friends.

He was mid 40s. I was twenty two. I kind of looked up to him a little bit. We just kind of hit it off really well. It was a real nice, cool guy and we hung outside the office. So happy hour. Sometimes I had him over for a barbecue. He kind of did the same in his place. In the office, everybody knew was just kind of being friends. He was well respected in the office.

He was trying to get custody of his kids and it was about a three month battle with his ex-wife who lived in Canada. You know, we had pictures of his boys up.

We knew he had kids. He came in and said, hey, I'm trying to get custody of my boys. You know, it's time I remember him saying that like it's time they're ready. And I just thought, that's pretty cool. You know, I have a really close relationship with my dad. And he had a 13 year old and 15 year old.

One day he came in after a long battle came in. I got my boys, we're all excited in the office for him. We had a little party for him. About a week later, the boys come back in town and he had me over for dinner, so I got a chance to meet the boys. You could tell they hadn't seen their dad in a while, they were very on their best behavior. He was as well. He was trying to make everything perfect for them was just a good night.

I was really excited for Don that this happened. About a month later, he comes to work and he goes, I'm going to go to Russia. Just out of the blue and I'm like, wow, you're taking the boys with you. He said, no, no, they're going to stay here. Which to me, I thought that was crazy, you know, a 13 and 15 year old, you just now get custody and you're going to go on a week long trip to Russia.

It just seemed strange, so he said, how can you keep an eye on him?

And I said, sure, I'll go over there, make sure that they don't burn down the house or something. You know, while he was gone and I took the boys to a movie one night, I took him to dinner one night, me and the boys, we kind of bonded while he was gone. A week goes by and this is where kind of things start to change. This guy walks in, remember, he's got normal gray hair, big locks, gray hair, he comes in, his hair is dyed, it's completely black, his shirt untucked.

He's got the top three buttons on button is hamburger meat. His hair is just they're just hanging out and he's got a big gold chain and it was just wild. He gives me a big hug and I'm like, look at this guy, you know, you see, he must have had a great time in Russia and I just couldn't wait to hear his his stories about Russia. Immediately, I noticed something was different. He was speaking in Russian and this isn't this guy is in Russian.

Never heard him speak in Russia, talk about Russia, anything. He's speaking in Russian. Even when he's speaking in English. He's speaking in a Russian accent. And at first, everybody's laughin, you know, sometimes you go to England or something, you come back with a little English twang or something. But now he was even speaking to customers on the phone in Russian in a Russian accent. And throughout the day, we thought, OK, that's what's funny, but it's time to give it a rest, but now it just gets thicker and thicker.

So the day ends, I don't think much of it, but that evening is when things really get disturbing. I'm sitting at home, it's dark. It's pretty late in the evening. I just remember all the lights were out. I'm sitting on my couch watching television and I get a ring. It's the oldest son. I said, Hey, hey, buddy, how's it going? And he was whispering. And I'll never forget this, he said, help, this isn't our dad.

I wanted to drop the phone. I wanted to hang up. I didn't want any part of it. I mean, I still get chills right now because I can hear that voice and I can hear them. He was desperate. And he said, well, this isn't our dad, and it was like a backtrack in a movie where everything's like, whoa, he gets his kids, he leaves for Russia, he comes back a totally different guy, new look, a new speech.

So I try to get more information like, hey, you know, what do you mean? What do you mean? He's not your dad just said, can you come over here? We're scared. We don't know what to do. So I go. It's about a 30 minute ride over to the house and in my head is racing and I didn't know what I was going to be walking into. It was pretty tense, my mind was fried a little bit.

I was definitely wondering, what am I getting myself into here? What am I going to walk into? So I go to the apartment, I knock on the door, he opens the door, arms out, big hug. You know, he's he's he's got that Russian accent again and he goes, come in. I'm making borscht. And at the time, I don't know what Borse was. Turns out later I find out it's a Russian dish.

The guy's in there making a Russian dish. He's he's Russian. The accent is even more thicker. The boys are kind of peering around the corner from the room. I'm scared to go into the kitchen, into the living room. At this point, I'm really investigating. I'm trying to figure out what's going on with Don. His eyes are different, chest hair hanging out, big gold chain, and he's full fledged Russian mobster. Now, I was in my head thinking, OK, it's not him.

And the boys just told me and they're living with him. He's been back a day, 24 hours, at least they're telling me this is not my dad. I do remember investigating. Looking at his eyes and say, is this is this Don? He's speaking like a mobster, he's carrying himself like a Russian mobster. I didn't know what was really going on with him or if it was even him. He's just a different guy. Go talk to the boys.

They are terrified. They feel trapped. And I said, you know, we've got to get a hold of your mom. Have you called your mom after the custody battle? I found out this that night the mom had moved to Israel. Now, this was early 2000s with a Google search. Wasn't as good when everybody had cell phones. So they had a hard time getting hold of their mom. There's nothing I can do at this time that I think your dad just needs you just need some rest.

It's a long trip. Twenty years old. I don't want to deal with this. I drive home. It feels like I'm in a Fellini film or something. I don't know what's coming and going at. My theory at first was he was Russian all along, um, maybe a Russian spy or a Manchurian Candidate or something like that. And his vision was over. And when he comes back to the states now, he can just be a full fledged Russian.

He didn't he didn't care. You look into the guy's eyes. He had a creepiness about his eyes, kind of a blank stare. He never broke character once. I go to work the next morning and he's still in the same getup, carrying himself like a Russian mobster, he's just not himself.

It got to a point where by lunchtime, my manager, our boss sends him home. And then, of course, everybody at work is coming up to me saying, hey, you know, what's what's up with Don? Why is he acting like that? It's it's so weird. And I don't have any answers for him. We do decide to go do a little happy hour, some of the guys and gals at work. And it just gets even creepier.

We're a little happy, our spot, we're talking about them, we're kind of telling the story. Everybody's got an opinion on what happened to Don. I'm talking it gets quiet and I can tell it like he's behind me and he's just standing there with this stare with these eyes, dark black hair from the dye, his Russian mobster get up the outfit. He's just standing there looking at us at our table. And I remember that night, it turned from it was funny to a little bit annoying, you know, you got this accent annoying to now I'm just angry.

I'm like, come on, man. Like, what is wrong with you? We all leave. We spread out and then I go home. I have my girlfriend over at the house. I remember that. And it's pretty late and there's a knock on the door. He just shows up at my house that night. He says that I owe money. It was a weird, long, convoluted story of why I owed him money. And now I'm thinking, oh, man, now I don't want to make this guy angry.

I got to get him away from my house. At this time, I am starting to get a little scared. So I took him to the bank right up the street. And really it was just to get him away from my house. You know, I talk to my mom about this, of course. And my mom's like, you know, you need to call the cops. You don't need to be involved in any of this. You know, distance yourself.

To me, I couldn't it was my friend, I knew something was wrong, I knew how hard it was for him to get the custody of his kids. But still back of my head, I didn't know what was really going on, given the money and he. The next morning, I go to work, he doesn't show up to work. I call the boys and there's still a little frightened. And they say he didn't come home last night.

And I'm kind of fearing the worst. They said, can you come get us we just want out of here. I come, I get home, I leave a note for Donna, says, hey, man, you're fucking up here. You know, you need to get things straight. I have your boys and you got to start acting right. Once I had the boys at my house, that was probably when things came to a head that night around 10 to 12 o'clock.

It was late. I've been raining and storming. I get another knock this time it's louder. I mean, it's a boom. I just looked at the people and it's him. He had been raining that night really bad. The wetness of his black dyed hair is just flowing in his eyes and it's all in his face and he's just drenched. He was an angry Russian mobster and I had just kidnapped his kids. It was it was scary. You say you kidnapped my kids, you kidnap my kids and you have my kids give me my kids and I told them through the door I didn't open the door to door.

Hey, yeah, I have your boys, but they don't want to go with you. They're scared and I'm scared. I tell them, listen, I'm about to call the police if you don't leave, and at this point he slows down and he says, OK, I'll be better tomorrow.

I'll be better tomorrow. I felt crazy.

Is this real is this really going on, is this is this Don is this really Don, like looking them up and down and trying to remember back to all the times I met Don or what are the clues? It was a perfect Russian accent, he was speaking in Russian. Not just a Russian accent like you're playing around. It was like is is is Russian brothers something? The hair was different, it was it was a totally different guy. What did this guy do with Don?

The boys were thinking, what did this guy do, who's acting like our dad and telling us that it's their dad? What do they do with our real dad? At this point, I mean, he knows where I live, I am really scared and I'm debating, I think I need to call the cops. I think I need to get them involved on this.

Next morning, he comes to work. He is again just out of control at work. The boss comes over and fires them. He gets fired and he doesn't take it very well, he takes one of those tin cans, you know, the holiday tin cans with popcorn in it, he takes one of those and he throws it at the boss. Popcorn goes everywhere. They call the cops.

And the police come and put them in a straitjacket. And that was the last last time I saw Don. After he left, of course, the whole office, you know, people are saying it is a Manchurian candidate or it's his evil twin brother or something. There was a lot of other theories about what happened after that, maybe a lot of rumors, what I saw was a normal guy.

Within a week comes back as a totally different, totally different guy. The boys ended up getting a flight out. The ex-wife sent some tickets. We got him on a plane and and got them back to to their mom. The ex-wife kind of filled me in on his life. Now, I knew him for two years, I was just this great guy, well respected, well put together guy by. He wanted to take care of his kids so well that he felt like he needed to give them a mother.

So he went to Russia to get a mail order bride. While he was there, he forgot his medication from the state's. And I didn't really know about mental illness at that time, but once he got to Russia, he didn't have his medication. When his mind flipped, he was rushing. That was his new normal, that was his new life, he was a Russian. To to see a person that you respected who was living a normal life, to see how that can just change in an instant, really opened my eyes to just how tragic mental illnesses.

Early on, again, it was funny, it was annoying, and then it was I was just angry. Then it was tragic. I hope you found these stories stimulating once again, this exclusive collection is entirely free of charge, but be that as it may, we're still a local business struggling a little bit. So if you don't mind, here's a quick message from our sponsors. So many of us moved through our lives and days unaware of the path that has guided us, and sometimes you need somebody to help you see beyond the obvious.

That's why I'm making the connection with California psychics. So, guys, I just had another reading and it was, again, a great experience this time. My psychic adviser's name was Charlie, and he made it so easy and comfortable to talk about my working career. Plus, he gave me some awesome advice and I'm really looking forward to doing another reading. California Psychic's has over 400 psychics available 24/7 any time of the day. Maybe you're up late and need somebody to talk to.

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Death, a dear, dear, dear listener, death, death, dear, dear listener, death, the biggest of all topics, whether it's accidental or purposefully covered up or some other option, is something that every family must deal with eventually. And at the case, family funeral, home discretion is their middle name, but also hope. Hope is also the middle name and also economics. Economics is their middle name. If three middle names in the case family cares about your experience, they offer a myriad of options for your dearly departed, including an inside the coffin safety lock and key motion sensor to interior lighting and a reserve oxygen tank just in case case.

Family Funeral Home. Thank you very much. Oh my God, I'm not finished. Thank you so much for bearing with us through these ads, please patronise all of the advertisers. OK, next one, here we go. Popping it in. In 2013, I moved to a new city. Start my first real job after college, I was working as a public health nurse at the time, doing home visits to families in the central city. I moved into this wonderful old apartment building in this working class neighborhood, it was old and creaky and just had a lot of character and that I just I just really loved the.

The small it was like eight units. Old old place, no air conditioning, needed to sleep with the windows open. I never saw my neighbors. First summer I was there. Things were less ideal. Around 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning, I woke up to some loud voices. I thought I could hear to a man and a woman, a high voice and a low voice going back and forth with each other. Pretty, pretty loud or not a conversation.

It was it was more like a fight, like an argument. And it was loud enough to wake me up. But it wasn't particularly violent or concerning. It was it was just there. I assumed that it was from the bus stop blow my open window. And so I thought, oh, it must be, you know, some spat. None of my business. I remember looking out the window and seeing people at the bus stop, but I couldn't read into their body language enough to know if it was them or not.

I remember thinking, oh, no, this neighborhood is not as perfect as I thought it would be.

After a few minutes, it quieted down and I just went back to sleep. It happened probably five or six more times that summer, always two or three a.m., always two voices, always loud enough to wake me up, but I can never really make out any words to these people again. Have they not solved whatever issue this is? It is not worth waking me up. Why consistently choose this time to to solve this disagreement? There were a few times where I was so irritated that I would yell, Hey.

Out my window and the voices would stop. There were also some times where I would wake up around that like three o'clock witching hour and it would be silent, but I would feel like there had just been a noise. When things really got uncomfortable was when it got cold out. It's too cold to sleep with my window open, then I heard it again and it was louder and it took me a couple of nights before I realized it was coming from the downstairs apartment below me.

I just remember in those hazy morning hours realizing it is louder tonight and my window is shut. So this is not coming from outside. Then it was clear that the direction was down and was the downstairs apartment. I had assumed it was two partners arguing about something and why they would be arguing at that time, I didn't know. What was confusing about it was that there were also noises that were not voices. It wasn't moaning or screaming. It was just expressing without any words with like a slide to the pitch.

Like mouth and throat, like open.

It's like, oh, then in like many different octaves, kind of like a was very odd at the time, I was going back to my coworkers and saying, I do not know what is going on in my apartment, but you guys need to listen to this because it's it's so strange.

Some strange arguing partners and none of my business. One day I happened to come home at the lunch hour and I came in through the back door of the apartment and I heard it again and it was mostly the higher pitched voice that day. It sounded like someone was getting the shit beat out of them that day. It was a woman's voice and it sounded bad. It was too uncomfortable to listen to and not do anything about. That day, I made the choice to to knock on the door and to ask if someone was OK.

The door was probably four or five paces from where I had entered the building. So however many seconds it took me to get there is when I decided I was going to do something, I immediately pulled out my cell phone and I dialed 911, wanted to push call I just had in my hand just in case. I was nervous about what I might find, but I had to know I had to know at that point. I could hear just standing outside of her door, looking at her door.

I could hear it and I knocked really hard on the door and said, hey, hey, what's going on in there?

As I yelled and knocked, it wasn't as if time had slowed down my yelling and the noises met each other and there was no more noise and she opened the door and was just there.

It was it was so quick. It was so it was so fast. She was at the door. She must have just been like right on the other side of it.

She was this middle aged white woman, graying hair. Her face was flat, there was nothing about her face that would say that she was just in danger. She was a shorter woman.

And so I could see past her head, past her shoulder into the apartment. And it was calm. It was a normal apartment cat was sort of sitting casually on the couch. There was nothing out of place. There was a couch. There was an Afghan thrown over the couch.

I mean, this was just a normal apartment. It was not commensurate with the sounds that I heard coming up to it, which I think was very jarring. Yeah, it was unusual and I just said, are you OK? And she said, yes.

And I said, Are you alone? And she said, Yes, yes, I am. And then very quietly and politely shut the door in my face.

And I just stood there so confused.

What was going on about what I had heard, what I had been hearing, the way that she answered the door, it was so fast no one could have had there couldn't have been anyone else in the apartment. I knew she wasn't hiding someone else in the apartment, it was too fast and the apartment was too open for anyone else to have been there. I knew. I knew that. Someone is ill and there's only two options, either.

She is deceiving me or I am deceiving myself. About what I think I'm experiencing. Honestly, I was thinking one of us is out of our goddamn minds because who someone something is something is going on. Again, what I had been hearing and what I had heard, I knew what I heard for months now, she'd been hearing voices coming from the downstairs apartment, convinced it was two people arguing. But there are also some sounds that were a little harder to explain.

Voices shifting octaves, this sliding pitch, none of it made any sense. But what was even more puzzling was that in the downstairs apartment where the noises were coming from lived a little old lady and her cat, no one else at all.

Was it just all in her head? He'd soon find out. That night, I heard this again. Is very distinct, higher voice and lower voice. And again, these sort of angry who whines or cries or whatever you would call them.

I didn't know how much longer I could not know for. And that night I went down and just listened and I thought, maybe if I don't interrupt, I will find out what is going on. That is when I heard it. And it was a couple seconds of hissing noise in between this higher tone, in this lower tone.

It sounded as if there was some sort of pressurised can that she was inhaling in between these these noises. My stomach kind of dropped a bit, and that's when I realized that, you know, my neighbor was huffing something. Probably a solvent. They're very dangerous because hallucinations and they have this uncomfortable side effect of dropping your voice down to this kind of demon register. She must have been struggling with this for many months. She was alone, she really was alone in there the whole time.

Dear listener, I have an announcement to make. Unfortunately, we're no longer being supported by the case Family Funeral Home, I regretfully announce that it has closed down since our last installment. However, I am happy to declare that radio rental is now being represented by Oberlin probiotics. So if you're feeling bloated, gassy or constipated, Oberlin can help. If your diarrhea is negatively affecting your public pool usage, they can also help. Don't let gastrointestinal health affect your productivity.

Go with Oberlin probiotics because as Gore Vidal once famously said, first coffee, then a bowel movement. Then the muse joins me. Oberlin probiotics. Now, I hope you aren't afraid of no ghosts. I ain't afraid of no ghosts.

So I'm a retired criminal investigator from DuPage County, the next county west of Cook County, where Chicago is. I grew up in a in a house in Cicero since I was like in first grade through high school.

I'm probably one of the biggest skeptics because I believe the cops basically are skeptics. I mean, that's their general default. Well, you know, you're talking to someone. You assume they're lying to you. It's kind of the investigative mindset. The best I can remember, I was probably between like 12 and 15. I know what happened. I can explain what happened, but I can't give you a reason as to why. I want to say was the late 70s, maybe 77, 78.

I was actually in the living room watching TV with my youngest brother, and I wanted to go get a glass of iced tea. My mom always had a two litter pitcher of iced tea in the in the fridge. I'm like, I'm going to get something to drink. So I go in the kitchen, I pour myself a glass of iced tea, and I look over at the stove and I assumed it was my mom. At that point. She was wearing a housecoat and she was cooking something on the stove in a pot.

So I didn't see your face. I just saw the housecoat. She was about the size of my mom. Her hair looked similar from the back, so it didn't really strike me as weird. I poured the glass, feisty one, back in the living room and went back to watching TV. But then I realized I left the remote to young guys a lot of work to just get off the couch and change channel, you know, so we need the remote.

So I thought I left a remote in the kitchen. You know, I'll go back up and get it. My brother is like, no, no, I'm going to get something to drink. I'll grab it. Would you leave your assets on the counter? So he runs, he gets a glass of iced tea, comes back with a glass of iced tea, but no remote. So he did the same thing I did. I'm like, where's the remote?

And he said, I left in the kitchen. So we both get up and we go back into the kitchen to grab the remote and we both kind of stopped. Looked around and this woman wasn't there. There is no dishes in the sink, there's nothing on the stove. I just looked at him, he looked at me, we both had this bewildered look on her face and before we could even say anything to each other, hear the people coming down from upstairs, it's my parents, my mom and dad.

And my mom is completely dressed and they're moving furniture. We both looked at my mom and then we both looked at each other again. And I'm like, Dude, you did see you did see what I saw, right? Did you see Mom in here cooking when you came out here, he just kept looking at me like scared to death. I couldn't even say a word, but just kept nodding his head. Yes, he just staring with his eyes really wide at them, coming downstairs.

And you just kind of shook his head. Yes.

I said, ma'am, were you just down here a minute ago cooking? She said, no, I've been upstairs moving furniture with your dad. And I'm like, there was a woman here cooking and we both saw her, she goes, You guys are nuts. And that was the end of it. And we still tell the story of this day. And my mom still thinks we're crazy. I wasn't like what people picture to be a ghost or something where they're half transparent or floating above the floor or something.

It just looked as real as you and I sitting here. The woman in the kitchen, I thought was interesting because it was two different people saying the same thing.

Most people explained ghost sightings or whatever, paranormal experiences to imagination, hallucinations, something like that.

It's very difficult for two people and two different times to witness the exact same thing without any corroboration. I would have said, hey, there's this woman in the kitchen and put that in my brother's mind. But we both saw the exact same things, which to me means there were some sort of physical manifestation, because if I could see it and he could see it, it had to exist at some point other than in our head. So there had to be something physical going on.

And like I said, I'm not going to say it was a ghost. I'm not going to say it was the spirit of someone who died in there. I've had friends that say, well, maybe it was a wormhole or something, a temporary opening that allowed you to see into the past and then it closed up. That's as good as any other explanation, I suppose, other than a woman breaking into our house, cooking and cleaning really fast and leaving.

There were different times. He was alone in the kitchen. I was alone in the kitchen.

We saw the same thing. So. Hmm, I love ghosts, beautiful creatures. I actually have a ghost, we have a ghost right here at Radio Rental. Did you know that? Oh yes. A real force of nature. Sometimes you'll knock down that entire row of tapes on the side wall and be a bit of a pain in the ass. Actually, when I could use is a ghost who knows quick books and a ghost can organize my photos and sync up my all of my Apple accounts.

If you know any ghosts like that, send them over because I can afford to pay them in ghost dollars. Anyway, moving on. Hey, I'm Michael Imperioli. And I'm Steve Sherpa's, and we want to tell you about our podcast, which is called Talking Sopranos.

So for the past few months, we've been having a blast going through The Sopranos series, episode by episode, talking about how the show was made, what was going on behind the scenes and kind of obsessing about all kinds of stuff.

We've also had some amazing guests on the show, Edie Falco, Lorraine Bracco, Vinny Pastore, David Proval, John Ventimiglia, and that's just to name a few.

And coming up, we've got Steve Buscemi, Aida Totoro, Catherine Douchy, plus a bunch more of the writers, directors and production crew.

And we're just getting started, really. By the time we're done, we'll probably get the entire cast and crew talk about everything that made this show so great.

The first two seasons flew by and I'm excited for season three.

So get talking Sopranos on your Apple podcast app, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

Watch this on YouTube. Remember that Talking Sopranos, and we'll see you soon.

What is the biggest scandal in American sports history was even bigger than we thought. In 2007, NBA referee Tim Donaghy was caught betting on games that he referee, but he wasn't just putting a few pennies in his piggy bank. No, he was at the center of a multibillion dollar scheme making big money for who else? The Mafia. The NBA said it was just on just one bad apple. But according to Tim Donaghy, he wasn't the only one.

This isn't a story about basketball. This is a story about money and the things powerful people will do to make certain problems disappear. A new podcast available now from tenderfoot TV. This is Whistleblower Listen for Free on Apple podcast. Hmm, fascinating stuff. Thank you, patrons, all some really intriguing products, if only radio rental could afford a commercial like that, then maybe we wouldn't be struggling to make ends meet. And I could leave this shitty hell hole of a video rental job.

No, not that this isn't a worthy pursuit, of course. No, no. I chose this path for now. I'm simply building myself back up like a phoenix rising from the ashes. My adoring fans don't worry, Doc Air with Terry Carnation will be back on soon enough. But for now, we'll dive back into the tapes, shall we? We were going to dog sit out in the middle of nowhere. We've gotten there early to take the people we were dog sitting for to the airport.

Right. As we're getting ready to drop them off, they say, do you see the neighbor? Don't worry about him. He's kind of weird, but he's completely harmless.

We drive back to the house, play with the dogs for a bit, playing Frisbee they love fetch. It gets closer to about five o'clock. And I start bringing bags in and I hear somebody slam a door and say, Where did you go?

And I'm like, Oh, that's none of my business. I hear him yelling to this phone. I do care about my kids. Oh, that's really none of my business. I try to just turn around and start going inside. Then I hear the dogs start going crazy. I turn around and he's standing at the end of our driveway just staring at me. And the dogs are running at him and they're barking viciously. These dogs, they are trained very well where even though I'm not their mom, they will listen to me like I am.

So they start running right at him and I'm like, Buck, Billy, get back here. And then immediately they do. And he says, I know. And then he just goes, You all right? And I was like. I'm totally good. Hey, how are you doing? And I said, are you all right? And he goes, I was asking, you know, I'm totally good. We're dog sitting this week for them and he just stands there and just stares at me.

And it's just like awkward for like a minute and a half. It felt like forever.

And then I took my stuff inside and he's just staring at me. So I tell Tara, I'm like, all right, let's relax, let's watch some TV. Tara is my girlfriend and we've been together for three coming on three years now. It's not the greatest environment for our relationship. Once we get out to the boonies, depending on the side of town you're on, really is the reaction you're going to get. If we're downtown, people are pretty cool about it.

Usually just leave us alone. But as soon as you start making it out to where the cornfields just stretch on and on, that's where we get people who have followed us home yelling names at us. The whole time. I've had people yell threatening stuff at me like I'm a dyke and I should go die because nobody wants me to live. Start watching some TV in about an hour later, the dogs just start barking like crazy again, like when they saw him like viciously and they run from the couch to the kitchen.

I see the neighbor on a moped just staring in to her car. He drives around her car a few times, just looking in, and I'm thinking, oh, shit, she's got an equality sticker on the back of her car.

I'm just going to assume he doesn't like women, doesn't believe in equal rights, and now we definitely have a target on our backs because he knows we're in relationship. After he circles her car a few times, he goes to my car, he circles my car probably two or three times looking into it.

I tell her I'm like, you should probably text the owners.

They reply with if you feel unsafe, call the police department, call it a specific one. They know him. They'll come talk to him before they had left. They they did tell me, here's a gun if you need it. So I grabbed the gun at this point and then he drives off and we start watching TV again and he comes back, this time he parks his moped next to my car and takes a couple steps like into the yard.

And he's just staring at the house.

He's doing the thing with his head where he's like just twisting it back and forth. He looks like he is full of hate. He would only take, like, one step and then he'd stop and he'd stare and he'd twist his head. Then you take another step. But then he'd stop and I heard him yell something. Then he'd go really quiet. Each time he came back, he was getting closer and closer to the door. At this point, when he's on the porch, the sun has set, so we go upstairs, but one of the dogs is so old it can't get up.

So he's down there whining because he's all by himself while the other one's right next to us. And I look down and he's standing on the front porch the way he was just standing and twisting his head back and forth. And I can hear him like I could make out the fact that he's talking to himself. He's still twistin his head back and forth, he lights a cigarette and then he starts lighting matches just one by one, he'd light it and then he'd throw it down on the porch.

He'd talk and he'd twist his head and then he'd light it and throw it back down on the porch. He stood there. He smoked a whole cigarette while burning matches and thrown them on the ground. And then he walks back to his moped and leaves.

They asked us if we wanted to do it again, and they pay us very, very well, I'm trying to pay off my student loans. So I was like, yes, without even consulting her, I will do that. No problem. We're watching TV again. We're watching our favorite show. How to get Away with Murder or anxiety is already really high. Some shit just went down and she gasps. So we're watching TV and I just feel like I need to glance over.

I don't know, I just got this like kind of like the hairs standing up on your neck, just this weird feeling of someone's watching me. I look over. To the door, and I gasped really loud and I just felt all of my blood rush. So I said, what is it? I saw Ray's shadow. In the stained glass. Why is he just peeking through and watching us and how long has he been there? So I hop up and I said, get your phone ready to call the police just in case.

And I grab my knife and I put it in my sweatpants that I'm wearing and I had it open and I walk out the back door. This was the first time I'd ever seen him up close.

He's still by that side door kind of doing the same thing with his hand, just trying to peek into it, you know. And I said, what the fuck are you doing, man? And he said, oh. And I said, What are you doing, Ray? Why are you at the front door?

And he says. Can you let me in? I said, no, that door doesn't work. What are you doing? And he said, I'm looking for my nephew's.

Like, it was a question and I was like, well, we haven't seen anybody and I said, how old are they? Like 10 and 12? Then my head, I'm thinking they haven't been here.

I've not heard any kids at all since we've been here. And I said, no kids have been over here. If I see them, I'll tell them to come home.

But nobody's here.

Once I said there are no kids here, Ray, there was like this sudden realization on his face, he went from like being super concerned and angry to, oh, shit, maybe there aren't any kids here.

You starts walking towards me and he's got one arm kind of behind his back leg and now he's standing about a foot away from me. My girlfriend was standing on the porch the whole time with one dog. The other dog is next to me. When he would move, the dog would start barking at him again and he'd go, You know me, I know you. His eyes did not seem there. Like it definitely wasn't somebody who is sane, kept looking around everywhere.

And as he's standing there, his arms are kind of swaying. I mean, his arms would just kind of move like he wasn't really controlling them too much. They just like swayed by his side. Guys see that he's got one arm back, though. And as he moved away from the bush, I saw him bring that arm out with the machete.

Half my brain was working against the other half.

Half of it is like, breathe, stay calm, collect yourself. Just be real with him as you would with anybody else. But then half of it is like, run. This guy has a machete and he's clearly fucked up the whole time. I'm like glancing up at his face, but really I'm watching the machete. It was buckled, you know, it's latched and I'm like, I have a knife. It's Al- already. If he goes to unbuckle this, I'm going to stab him and run.

He starts walking back, so we go inside, we start trying to watch the show again and she says, I really like the show, I can't pay attention right now. And I said, OK, well, why don't we watch something feel good?

As I said that, here comes Ray walking past the main window. He's not like looking into the house, but he's standing there. He would swing his machete and then he put it down when he saw me in the dining room walking from the living room to the kitchen.

He stopped and he held whatever pose he had.

At this point, when I see him swinging this around, I say, we need to call the cops. We're out in the middle nowhere.

This is terrifying. I call the cops and I'm like, hey, this is our address. Cops say, hold on, we got to transfer you. You're in a different county. And I'm like, no, we're right on a county line. The owner of the house told us that. I need to tell you, this police station needs to come out and talk to this guy because they've had multiple interactions with him. And she goes, well, unfortunately, you're not in our jurisdiction.

He's literally striking poses like he would hold it up, like if he were swordfight or getting ready for a sword fight and he'd hold it there and then swing. He just swing like full force. And they're like, well, don't worry about that. Just leave all the lights on, make sure all the doors and windows are locked. WILSON Somebody out there call disconnects. And it's like he starts pointing to the heights of where like a 10 and a 12 year old would be like he's giving him a lecture.

He would point at two separate nobodies and then he'd point to our backyard. And then he'd yell at them. But then he grabs the machete and he throws it up and then he strikes at the fake people that he was just talking to, right where their heads would be like where he was pointing, where these fake faces were.

I get a call from dispatch and they say the officer is getting ready to arrive. Is he still in your driveway? And I see headlights down the dirt road. One was an SUV, another was a canine unit, and then another was a Mustang. The Mustang whipped it like it was an emergency. So one of the cops in the very first SUV at the front of the line, he gets out and he starts walking towards the back yard with his flashlight, no gun or anything, just his flashlight.

And then I see another one get out of the canine unit and it starts walking towards where the pool and the orchard is. We're standing in the kitchen. The cop turns around with his flashlight and had already pulled his gun out and yells, Drop your weapon. And then I hear a man start like screaming in pain and crying, like wailing. Then we see an ambulance coming down the dirt road. Eventually, you know, after the ambulance takes off, one of the cops comes back, he comes up to the door and he asks if we wouldn't mind writing a statement.

Yeah, that dude's pretty wacko. We're going to take him in. We had to tease him. So if you wouldn't mind just writing down the statement, I'll be back with some paper and pens here in a second.

I have a friend who her hobby is looking into public records, police records, stuff like that. And so she found him. You know, she found his mug shot from that night. Turns out he was actually really high on meth and apparently he had over five grams of meth on his person when they tase them. He also tried to run, apparently. So they arrested him for having meth and for running from the police.

And they did ask us after we had written our statements, if we need you, can you testify? And I was like. You have our statements, but if he's going to get out and see my face again, no, thank you, I won't do that. Honestly, I think we've tried to start, like, repressing that shit. Do you guys still watch those dogs? Not since. It's a classic scary story, staying in a house out in the middle of nowhere, then it gets dark and something threatening lurks.

But for these two women, it wasn't merely campfire. This time the threat was real. And thanks to their own good instincts, they made it out alive and the machete wielding man on drugs in the middle of nowhere was put away for.

Oh, a wild ride, that one, what a terrifying experience for that couple. But seriously, it had me on the edge of my seat. Radio rental will return in several months with new tapes, new stories. And in the meantime, may I interest you in renting the Deluxe Demon Baby package? That's two movies for the price of one, Rosemary's Baby by Roman Polanski. And then my personal favorite, Jack Hill's 1967 Spider Baby. Hmm. Hmm.

Interesting. No. Well, maybe next time anyway. Dear friends, dear friends, all my love yours. Terry Carnation. Stay spooky.

Hey guys, thanks for listening to Episode six of Radio Rental. And don't worry, we're not going away for long. Tune in next week for a different kind of radio rental episode that we're calling Radio Rental Rewind. In next week's episode, we'll be playing extended clips from my interviews this season, taking a deeper dive into some of the weirdest stories you've heard, like Law of the Woods for or for not found doppelganger for some of these. There is more to the story.

Tune in next week to find out. We'll be exploring some of these stories even further and playing some raw tape from my interviews. And don't worry, we've been hard at work on our next batch of radio rental episodes. Tune back in next week to learn more about what's next for radio rental. And as promised, here are the winners of our one of the kind radio rental VHS tapes, Adam Alltech, Brown Me 214, Bongers nine thousand, Chloë Vidana, Bill E Vader, Johnny Hudson, Mr.

Coleman, Atle Binley five five three six eight. Gulf War II, eight eight. And Marilyn got change. And drumroll, the winner of our radio rental store manager action figure is Square Bear. Ali, if you heard your username, please send an email to radio rental winner at Gmail dot com. Again, that's radio rental winner at Gmail dot com.

Radio rental is created by Payen Lindsay and brought to you by tenderfoot TV in Atlanta. Executive producers Lindsay and Donald Allbright, hosted by Rainn Wilson as his character Terri Carnation, produced by Pam Lindsay, Mike Rooney and me Meredith Steadman, written by Meredith Steadman with additional writing by Mark Loflin, Sound Design by Cooper Skinner, original score by Makeup and Vanity said additional production by Christina, Dana and Mason Lindsay Cover Art by Trevor Ilar and Rob Sheridan, voice acting by Ryan Jones, Casey Willis and the tenderfoot Tveit.

Shout out to Tony Doors atto for the creation of our real life miniature radio rental store. You can check that out and more on their Instagram at Tiny Doors Attia special thanks to Grace Royo and Orin Rosenbaum at Etai, as well as support from the nerd group Station 16 backed media and marketing and the team at kadence 13. If you have a radio rental story that you'd like to share, please email us at your scary story at Gmail Dotcom or contact us via the forum on our Web site.

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